County slips back to last in kids' care

Child poverty remains persistent

Apr. 24, 2014

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Cumberland County is back on the bottom according to an advocacy group that crunches statistics on areas ranging from school lunch availability to infant mortality to generate a county-by-county healthy rating for New Jersey.

The Advocates for Children of New Jersey officially releases its annual New Jersey Kids Count Pocket Guide today. Thirteen measurements of quality of life are aggregated to produce its ratings.

In 2013, the Kids Count report raised Cumberland County from 21st place the prior year to 20th place in child quality of life.

This year, Cumberland County is back at 21. Salem County, which was dead last in the 2013 report, this year improved to 19th in the state.

Cumberland is one of 10 counties in a worse overall condition, and South Jersey is well-represented at the bottom of the pack. Atlantic, Salem and Camden counties join Cumberland on the low end, along with Essex County.

At the other end of the state, and at the top of the report, is Hunterdon County.

According to Advocates for Children of New Jersey, the reasons vary why counties move up or down or not at all in the annual ratings.

Cecilia Zalkind, executive director of the organization, said the data does give useful trends for governments and other social welfare organizations to use.

Data are drawn from different years, complicating the assessments. For example, poverty line estimates compare 2008 and 2009 figures. Unemployment and food stamp assistance figures compare 2009 and 2013 figures.

Among the trends are increasing child poverty, fewer child care options for working parents and high housing costs.

The report finds child poverty, which began rising when the recession struck in 2008, remains persistent in most counties, with the exception of steep declines in Warren County and Salem County and a narrow drop in Morris County.

New Jersey had 6 percent fewer child-care centers statewide last year than in 2009 and a reduction of more than 11,000 spots for kids, the report says. The number of people registered with the state to care for children in their homes fell 29 percent. The supply of licensed child-care centers nudged up modestly in Cumberland, Hudson and Passaic counties, stayed level in Mercer and Monmouth counties and declined in the other 16 counties, including a 22 percent plunge in Cape May County.

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Child care also is more expensive than national standards recommend. The report finds the average New Jersey family with an infant and toddler in a child-care center spends 24 percent of its income on care, more than double the recommended 10 percent. It’s 30 percent or higher in six counties.

“This lack of affordable and accessible options means that working parents may have to choose substandard or inconsistent care, especially for younger children, who need safe, nurturing environments during their most formative years,” says the report.

The availability of in-school breakfasts for students improved in every county. Cumberland fed 56 percent of eligible students in 2013, which is the highest among counties. It was No. 2 last year.

Cumberland, Hudson and Essex counties were the only three in which the number of licensed child care centers increased, although the increases were small.

However, the cost of day care, relative to families’ incomes, is high and ranges from a low of 18 percent in Warren County to a high of 33 percent in Essex and Passaic counties.

The number of children not covered by health insurance has been trimmed nearly in half, or 105,000, between 2008 and 2012, largely due to increased enrollment in NJ FamilyCare’s free or low-cost health plans. From 2009 to 2012, the number of uninsured children fell in all but three of New Jersey’s 21 counties — but it rose at rates the Kids Count report deemed alarming, 29 percent to 45 percent, in those three counties, Sussex, Morris and Middlesex.

Greg Potter, spokesman for Inspira Health Network — the hospital system covering Cumberland County and beyond — said the report wasn’t sent ahead of time to the hospital system, but it and studies like it are reviewed as the system sets its priorities and strategies.

“And we’re obviously dedicated to promoting wellness for everyone in our community, including children, and we have collaboration with many agencies to address community and health issues that affect children,” Potter said.

The Anney E. Casey Foundation provides funding for Kids Count reports across the nation. Advocates for Children of New Jersey is the grant recipient in this state. Besides the Pocket Guide, a state-level date report called New Jersey Kids County: The State of Our Children also was released.

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